


Holding On

by ForAllLove



Category: The Hobbit (2012), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - World War II, Bofur is the best, Craic-Ship, Desperation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Even if he is damaged this time around, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, I love you Bofur, Loss, M/M, Mild Gore, Romance, Slow Build, Soldiers, Violence, a little dark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-14
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-25 10:22:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/637884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForAllLove/pseuds/ForAllLove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>War has brought them together not once but twice. He won't let it separate them again. World War II AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holding On

**Author's Note:**

> The product of eighteen hours of I don't know where this came from. It did occasion some interesting research, and became quite interesting itself. Again, experimenting with style.
> 
> Prodigious thanks to [Sherlockian-Shireling](http://sherlockian-shireling.tumblr.com) for beta-ing all night and for the fantastic cover!

_He shakes. He sweats and shivers until he can’t keep anything down. His shoulder is ablaze, but the rest is so cold. It’s all hazy, all noise and wool and pain and lamp-light. He’s never been in such a pure delirium, of that he’s sure. He curls and uncurls, and tries to remember, and tries to forget._

_But there is a cool hand on his forehead. Someone eases the pain. That’s the memory that stays with him._

* * *

**September, 1944**

The mud doesn’t dampen his section’s spirits one bit as they march on to the company’s encampment. Well, half of them are mad Irishmen, and the rest are simply mad. There’s not much that can get them down. He stays sharp, though — the front line isn’t far off.

The major’s an imposing fellow, but they settle in as though they’re made for it. The field is crowded with men hurrying from one tent to another. He’s standing out of the way when a little medic whacks squarely into him. He catches the man, who seems nothing but helmet. The medic sputters. He laughs and sets him upright.

* * *

The company travels to the next town and the next. His French is rusty, but it’s enough to charm the locals out of a few cakes for his men and a pair of knitted gloves for the medic. Beneath that helmet, the medic is no more than a doe-eyed boy. He winds up handing his share of the cakes over with the gloves and wins a timid smile.

* * *

His section keeps to itself, usually, but the medic creeps closer every night. They finally give up and haul the boy over.

The Dublin lad, the boxing champ, even their bashful loader — each has his turn at teasing the little medic, who bears it all with good humour. Now they are eleven.

It becomes natural to walk with the red-crossed helmet wobbling beside him, just under eye-level.

* * *

The rumbling is only distant thunder, and rain soon follows. His lance corporal swears it doesn’t sound right. They keep marching.

His shoulder soon goes stiff, and it hurts too much to work it out. There isn’t one comfortable position to lie in. The medic doesn’t ask, just sleepily digs his little gloved hands into the muscles until they ease.

* * *

His lance corporal’s hunches are never wrong. The enemy’s line has moved up.

* * *

The skirmish is a victory for the company. The line is pushed back and they will soon meet with the battalion coming down from the north. But the battle had its costs in the lives of a dozen men. His section paid dearly: a grenade tore apart the Dublin lad with the quick smile, not ten feet from some of them. He is shaken. It is only a matter of time before the medic breaks down.

Sure enough, once the wounded are stabilised, the little medic tumbles out of the aid tent and into him. He hugs the lad until there are no more tears left. He doesn’t know what else to do.

So he offers to sit up with the wounded, to keep an eye on them while the medic gets some rest. 

It’s not unlike a dam breaking. The medic huddles beside him and doesn’t sleep, but talks, and talks, and talks, and it isn’t a child but a man who is revealed.

He listens.

* * *

The company presses the enemy back. Reinforcements never come. His lance corporal watches the woods when they make camp.

The medic sticks closer to him now, sleeps easier when they’re within reach of each other. He does, too. He thinks sometimes that he should make some distance, for the medic’s sake, but he doesn’t have the heart to. 

There’s another, smaller firefight with no casualties for the company. He comes out with splinters in his cheek. He doesn’t bother anyone about this until later, when the medic can pluck them out by firelight. The medic’s hands are cool, and they ease the pain.

* * *

The woods break onto an old battlefield strewn with barbed wire. The company moves into the trenches there. The enemy falls back to the far side. It’s a stalemate, until the Panzers show up.

Between the tanks and the mortars, the best the company can do is dig in and wait for the battalion. His section spends hours firing blind into the night. The medic is kept busy tending to the unlucky men who’ve caught flak.

There’s a quiet spell sometime in the early morning. He chooses to take his rest by watching over the nearby wounded. The medic is utterly banjaxed and slumps against his good shoulder. He lets the lad doze.

In that quiet spell, sometime in the early morning, he does a little talking of his own.

* * *

The sky is just beginning to lighten when the battalion arrives.

The major rallies them, to push out of the trenches and join the main force. It’s a frenzied few minutes of reloading and rechecking, and then the company begins its charge.

The noise is hellish. He braces against the wall of the trench, awaiting the order for his section to move out. A shell whistles directly over their heads. His gaze locks on the medic’s wide eyes for one dreadful moment. He’s been a soldier for years. He’s never been so frightened. The medic reaches for him, and they’re clutching, kissing, crashing against the wall, pouring their lives into each other—

Someone screams for a medic.

He holds on to his little medic for as long as he can, frantic to tell him something, anything, if only he’ll come back. One last kiss, and the medic is over the wall and away.

There’s just enough time for the cry that rips through his throat, just enough time to wish they could have had more.

The major gives the order.

* * *

The smoke is clearing. The battlefield is silent.

He staggers through destruction with his own blood on his hands.

He is alive.

His eyes struggle to focus on the men around him, moving men, living men. His loader’s ginger head is easy to spot. Further away, his lance corporal stands fierce and broken. He picks his way through fallen soldiers, searches, never too closely.

He’s looking for red crosses.

He’s covered half the battlefield before he reels around one more hillock, and there he is: his medic, battered but whole.

The medic comes to him with careful hands in tattered gloves, seeking the wound that has caused him to bleed so. He’s dizzy with it, but he’ll live, and so he laughs as he gathers his medic up, and into the morning he whispers his own name.

**Author's Note:**

> Though a happy ending seems improbable in every way, if _anyone_ can make it work, _they_ can.


End file.
